a workshop with Dion Ellis

the group met at Lighthouse Media Centre in Brighton after an introduction to each other, the day's activities, the Lighthouse building and other exciting events that happen there www.lighthouse.org.uk

tasks were team competitions with prizes

• online navigation: seek and acquire specific images
  satellite / earth / europe / uk / the south east / Brighton
  fine-tuning Web navigation and file sharing skills
  
  
• route race and quiz: locate and source a route from Lighthouse to Stanmer Park, navigating maps and info online
  1 Which search engine can you use to find images quickly ?
  ==== www.google.com
  2 Which search engine can you use to find maps quickly ?
  ==== www.yahoo.com click on maps
  3 Where can you find any street or town using the Internet ?
  ==== www.multimap.com advanced search street, town, post code
  4 Which web sites helps you find your way around Brighton ?
  ==== use a search engine to search under "Brighton, UK"
  www.my-brighton.co.uk/map.html
  www.brighton.co.uk/map bus routes, roads and trains
  www.thisisbrightonandhove.co.uk for LOCAL INFORMATION
  5 Where can you find bus routes for the South East of England ?
  ==== www.buses.co.uk
  6 Which buses could take us to Stanmer Park ?
  ==== 25 25A 28 28X 78 729 (can also view the timetable)
  
  
• during coffee break, Siddhi and Johnson found images of Nepal, locating friends and family home towns online
  
  
• idealLIVING; after coffee we took each other's photo, captured the digital images and put them into a
  PhotoShop montage. We discussed what we'd need for daily living in an 'ideal' home, sourcing and transforming furniture and fittings from international online stores, creating a virtual living space, addressing different cultural living encvironments and utilities.
  We also used 3D simulation software to construct a future living space using transformed geometric shapes, applying simulated material textures and viewed it, rendered, from any angle !

• we then explored the earthship website www.earthship.org
  addressing issues surrounding the environment and future living systems such as earthship biotecture.

• Earthship Quiz
  
  the following questions were raised and answered after visiting the earthship.org web site and meeting Ollie at the
  Brighton Earthship construction site at Stanmer Park.
  
  1 What is an Earthship ?
  ==== The Earthship is a completely independent globally oriented dwelling unit made from materials that are indigenous to the entire planet. The major structural building material is recycled tyres filled with compacted earth to form a rammed earth brick encased in steel belted rubber. This brick and resulting walls are virtually indestructible.
  2 How are they designed ?
  ==== with material efficiency and recycling in mind; to reduce our impact on the planet and increase our connection to it by utilizing recycled and low embodied energy materials, passive solar heating and cooling, photovoltaic power systems, catchwater, solar hot water, gray water and black water treatment systems. The techniques of building Earthships are presented and developed in a way that will allow Earthship owners to participate in and sometimes completely build their own home with many materials that are free by-products of our existing society. The homes are designed with simplicity in mind.
  3 do any exist yet ?
  ==== They exist now in Bolivia, Australia, Mexico, Japan, Canada, Honduras, Spain, all over the United States, and in the UK; there's one in Scotland.
  4 What are today’s natural resources?
  ==== We must consider plastics, oil etc. The US produces over 250 million tyres a year, the UK currently produces over 40 million tyres a year. Tyres do not decompose, this situation will not go away. It is not safe to bury or burn them. These things should be considered as materials for further use.
  5 Who are the Earthships for?
  ==== everyone, including future generations all over the globe
  6 Are they cheap to live in?
  ==== yes, they're an efficient, alternative source of housing
  7 How do you keep warm in an Earthship in England?
  ==== they are designed to source UV heat from the earth more efficiently than free-standing housing, they're built backed onto an earth mound, which releases heat at night. They also have sophoisticated solar and wind power systems for energy generation.

• after lunch we visited the Brighton Earthship site at Stanmer Park, meeting Ollie who showed us photographs, documentary time-lapse video and aerial shots of the site construction since April 2003, site plans and the site itself.
• at the Earthship we took photographs for a QuickTime Panorama, using a digital camera and tripod